The Department of Health reviews its arm’s length bodies once every 3 years. This triennial review looks at what the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) does and how. There is an opportunity to attend one of three workshops in London or complete an online response form.

The NHS Health Check programme is a national risk assessment, awareness and management programme that systematically targets the top seven causes of preventable deaths: high blood pressure, smoking, high cholesterol, obesity, poor diet, physical inactivity and alcohol consumption. The early identification and management of these risks could substantially reduce the morbidity, mortality and health inequalities that result from the diseases they cause, including diabetes, chronic kidney disease, dementia and cardiovascular disease.

The purpose of the paper is for PHE to consult on the key research priorities for the NHS Health Check programme. Research priorities for consideration are categorised according to the three key elements of the programme – recruitment, assessment/intervention and outcomes

This literature review, produced by the PHE Knowledge and Library Service with the support of the NHS Health Check Expert Scientific and Clinical Advisory Panel, identifies evidence relevant to the NHS Health Check programme

The Five Year Forward View has been developed by partner organisations that deliver and oversee health and care services including NHS England, the Care Quality Commission, Monitor, Public Health England, Trust Development Authority and Health Education England. Patient groups, clinicians and independent experts have also provided their advice to create a collective view of how the health service needs to change over the next five years if it is to close the widening gaps in the health of the population, quality of care and the funding of services.

The Five Year Forward View confirms support for the research and innovation agenda and the work of NIHR.

The competition enables researchers, patients and members of the public who have been involved in recently completed clinical, applied health or social care research to communicate the message about why the research is important, what is being done and the impact it may have.

In this round there are two categories of competition and an additional special prize.

The Central CRN Communications team has announced the launch of the new flagship magazine: Insight. This replaces ‘News from the Networks’ and reflects the new structure of the CRN. The theme for the first edition is ‘progress’ which is introduced by Jonathan Sheffield, CRN Chief Executive Officer.

AMRC calls on the current and future governments to support the UK medical research sector to ensure charities can continue to fund excellent science and develop life-saving treatments for patients.

The challenge builds on the three areas of need highlighted in the infographics sheets published by AMRC in September – strong foundations, skilled people and research at the heart of the NHS.

The new challenge builds on these three overarching themes by calling on current and future governments to:

Commit to stable investment for research – including an increase in the Charity Research Support Fund to reflect the increase in charity investment in research.

Support people and environment that enable research to flourish – encouraging training, development and retention of researchers, technicians and healthcare workers and a flexible, innovation-friendly regulatory environment.

Position research at the heart of the NHS – including close working with NHS England and CCGs to make sure Excess Treatment Costs are paid for and patient data can be shared safely and securely to support research and facilitate adoption of innovation.

The Health Research Authority (HRA), has launched a public dialogue exercise to gain better understanding of public attitudes towards the recruitment of participants in health research. “Recruiting participants for health research: a public dialogue” is being undertaken by the HRA with support from Sciencewise. Initially intended to take place over November 2015, the public dialogue has been extended to 5 January 2015.

RfPB have introduced a new opportunity to fund “higher risk” research, with a rule of thumb upper limit of £150K. Higher risk refers to the likelihood of the research leading to patient benefit, not risk to the patient. Examples of studies that might fall within this category of ‘higher risk’ research include:

Observational studies using clinical databases, which might provide preliminary estimates of an effect size that would be useful in the design of a clinical trial

Observational studies to establish for example the practicality and acceptability of changes to clinical practice, or the best means to ensure and measure adherence, prior to a formal evaluation

The following broad topics are likely to be commissioned during the next year and are anticipated to open on the date shown below. However, titles and timings may change.

Metabolic liver disease (including NAFLD) – February 2015

Pancreatitis – February 2015

Very low energy diets – February 2015

Diagnosis and treatment of allergies – February 2015

Early makers of treatment response – June 2015

Irritable bowel syndrome – June 2015

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New Reports / Publications

NIHR EME Programme Publications

The first projects funded through the EME Programme researcher-led workstream are now publishing in the NIHR Journal Efficacy and Mechanism Evaluation. All EME studies will publish in this journal providing open access to the full results to a wide audience.

The Health Services Research Network (HSRN) Symposium 2015 will take place on 1-2 July 2015 in Nottingham. The Symposium presents the leading edge of health services research in a multidisciplinary programme that includes research presentations and posters, alongside plenaries from research and service leaders. Abstracts, proposals to run sessions and nominations for the HSRN Impact award are now being invited. Closing date: 16 January 2015

We provide FREE advice on research design to researchers in the East Midlands who are developing proposals for open, national, peer-reviewed funding competitions for applied health or social care research.